What is the Church?
When I was a child my grandmother taught me a little rhyme that had a finger play that went along with it. As she showed me how to fold my hands so my fingers were on the inside we solemnly intoned "this is the Church." Next we took our our pointer fingers and pointed them toward the sky and said "here is the steeple." Now came the exciting part! We opened our hands a little and wiggled our fingers real fast and together we said "open it up and see all the people!" When I was four that was both informative and exciting.

What is the church? In common English usage, a church is a building where people of a common religious persuasion meet together to worship. When you say church most people thing building. Yet even in the finger play I learned when I was four there was more involved. There were all those wiggling fingers and to be perfectly honest that was what made the whole thing exiting. In the Bible, Old and New Testament, the places people met together were Synagogues, the Temple in Jerusalem or homes in most New Testament cases. Both the Hebrew word qahal and the Greek word Ecclesia which are translated in our English bibles as "church" refer to a gathering of people called together for a common purpose. This purpose was not necessarily religious in nature. I could be a gathering of men going off to war, or a group gathered together to take care of the new public works project in their village. The one thing is is not is a building.

So what is it that sets apart a gathering that meets together to decide civic matters from a gathering of the followers of Jesus? Both are gatherings only the purpose of the gatherings separates them at all. To be a Christian ecclesia or church the people must be gathered according to Christ's purposes to be distinctively Christian. Those distinctively Christian purposes are clearly evident in the New Testament. They provide a yardstick against which we can measure the depth of Christian or more personally "Resurrection Life" within our Church. They re set our in two interrelated categories, the people we are becoming individually and together in Christ, and the tasks that God has given us as a people of God.

The first of theses, the "becoming" category is best set out in the Great Commandment; Jesus said, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul. and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. An the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. (Matt 22:37 - 39 NRSV) If you love someone you have faith in them, you trust them and will listen and act on their advice. You carry hope for them in your heart You hope that they lead happy and fulfilled lives and that they will find their place in the life of God. This is a becoming category because it is a goal or vision set before us not an accomplished fact in any of our lives. A t RLC this is well expressed when we say:

"Resurrection Life = Faith + Hope + Love"

The second of these, the doing category are the things that people do who are deeply involved in their Love of Christ. It is best expressed in the Great Commission; Jesus came and spoke unto them, saying, All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. Amen. This is definitely and active"doing" kind of thing. At RLC we verbalize this active portion of what it means to be a church by saying "Resurrection People Invite, Grow and Serve." Under this phrase we include all of our outreach, or continued growth in faith and the servant heart that Jesus called us to have as we serve within and without of our fellowship.

We are a church! As we grow together in Faith, in Hope and in Love, Jesus will strengthen us and give us the resources we need to share that Love as we invite others in to our blessing, Grow deeper in Christ and Serve with the servant heart of Christ himself.

Pastor Jim

Pastor Jim Bliss
August, 2001